Chris Pontello

This series of paintings is inspired by the emotional color palette of Mark Rothko. It was almost impossible to replicate the color of his paintings directly because of the fact that I was using a different technique and medium as Rothko. His paintings involve large transparent brush marks of different levels of muted and saturated oil pigments; whereas mine are sprayed with large pools of acrylic spray paint. Nonetheless, I attempted to match some of those transparent glazes based on the perception of the literal color. Rothko Rothko Rothko Rothko Rothko

Chris Pontello Artist Statement:            My goal is to express something abstract in concrete form by using texture, form, and color. There is no process besides the process of experimentation in order to unearth a new visual language stemming from my subconscious. This aspect is important in order for me to act in spite of fear and to allow something truly unexpected to happen. Being vulnerable and open during the mark making process gives me freedom from myself and my own ego and allows me to create though an inkling of an emotional state.

This series of work was done with Nature Sketch paper, which will adopt an impression of whatever casts a shadow on it for about thirty seconds. I was initially inspired by the paper itself and curious to see what potential there was in drawing with sunlight. This fits with the aspect of my process that deals with allowing nature to intervene in my work, but with a very different aesthetic. With a monochromatic color scheme these pieces utilize value contrast to create the illusion of form. Some silhouettes are sharper than others because I experimented with moving my stencils in various speeds and directions. This was a process in seeing how far I could push this very limited medium without ruining it completely.